In July last year, a Pentagon official confirmed that the USS Stethem (DDG-63), an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer of the US Navy, sailed within 12 nautical miles of Triton Island in the Paracel Chain in the South China Sea.

BY-NC-ND/Michael Chu

If China invades Philippine-occupied island in disputed sea, US says it will help ally

(Agence France-Presse) - August 17, 2018 - 1:30am

Manila, Philippines — The United States will be "a good ally" to the Philippines in responding to territorial conflicts in the South China Sea, a US defense official said Thursday.

Randall Schriver, assistant secretary of defense for Asian and Pacific security affairs, gave the assurance as tensions rise over China's aggressive stance towards its claims to most of the strategic waterway.

Speaking to reporters at the US Embassy in Manila, Schriver was asked if the United States, which is bound to the Philippines by a mutual defense treaty, would help the country if China invaded the main Filipino-occupied island in the South China Sea. Pag-asa Island is the largest of the nine features controlled by the Philippines in the Spratly Islands.

"We'll be a good ally... there should be no misunderstanding or lack of clarity on the spirit and the nature of our commitment," he said.

"We'll help the Philippines respond accordingly," Schriver added, declining to give further details.

China and the Philippines, along with several other Asian nations, have conflicting claims to parts of the South China Sea, which is believed to contain vast mineral resources.

China has built up heavily defended artificial islands in the sea and Philippine observers have expressed concern in recent weeks over aggressive Chinese radio warnings to foreign planes against approaching them.

However, Schriver said US forces would continue to fly and sail in those waters.

"We've seen an increase in this kind of challenge from China, not only directed at us but others," he said.

"This kind of challenge will not result in a change of our behavior. We'll not allow them to rewrite the rules of the road or change international law."

Since he took office in mid-2016, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has been moving the country's relations away from its traditional ally the United States and towards China and Russia.

Schriver also cautioned the Philippines against buying large-scale weapons like submarines from Russia as some local officials have suggested.

"I don't think that's a helpful thing to the (US-Philippine) alliance and ultimately I think we can be a better partner than the Russians," he said.

The Fourth Industrial Revolution is a term that is becoming more and more widely used especially in the academic, business and science sectors. I was recently invited to be the guest speaker at the recognition rites of the graduate schools of the DLSU Ramon del Rosario College of Business.

Malacañang yesterday maintained that President Duterte does not know Wilfredo Keng, the businessman that sued Rappler for cyber liber, after an administration critic pointed out the government made decisions that favored his business.

Late last year the tax authorities issued a notice to the public identifying the top withholding agents (TWAs) who are mandated to withhold expanded withholding tax (EWT) equivalent to one percent on purchase of goods and two percent on purchase of services from local or resident suppliers, including non-resident aliens engaged in trade or business in the Philippines.